Talk:St. Peter's Island (PEI)/@comment-173.18.133.12-20140721212558/@comment-26552496-20150707222726
I think that helis could be nerfed easily by simply reducing their health, possibly at certain weakpoints (e.g. tail, back of fuselage). This way, helis would be forced to limit their attacks to short close-to-ground rushes for fear of being shot down by a lucky Cultist of Zubeknakov or Maplestriker hiding out in a building, or in the bushes with a ghillie (in fact, I predict that people might even start camping near areas frequented by choppers for the purpose of shooting them down and taking their presumably-endgame loot) Also, in order for people to shoot out of the sides of helis, they would need to be rather exposed. It's true that machine gun beats assault rifle more often than not, especially when the machine-gunner is on a swift-striking easily-repositioned aerial platform, but at the same time, heli gunners will be under the constant threat of a sniper picking them off after one too many passes over the same area. Ground troops have the advantage of stealth (the chopper, of course, being both visually and audially conspicuous) and physical & visual cover (e.g. inside buildings, or wearing a ghillie in the bushes). Meanwhile, the chopper and crew would have to be extremely vigilant and unpredictable in order to avoid being shot down, while lacking the stealth advantage (unless of course the Dev wants to add a stealth helicopter, but even then, a rooftop sentry with night-vision goggles could easily detect an incoming would-be Seal Team Six, although And lastly, let's take a look at the various conbative and non-combative liabilities of this aircraft. Helis would presumably require A LOT of gas. While you're up in the air, you would have to keep a closer eye on the fuel meter than you would in any ground vehicle, because unlike running out of fuel in a car and sputtering to a stop, if you run out of fuel in a heli you have a whole new set of issues to deal with. Firstly, if you don't land before your fuel runs out, you plummet from the air like a wounded (whirly)bird and will be likely to die from the impact. Even if you land in time, or even survive a crash, your noisy airborne helicopter would have announced your location to everyone in the vicinity, and you'll have to move quick to keep from being sniped or infected. At any rate, the main liability of a helicopter in any situation is that it's very conspicuous. A chopper couldn't simply drop into a gas station and fuel up, but would first have to drop a squad of troops at the periphery in order to secure the station from Maplestrikers hiding out in nearby buildings waiting for the chopper to touch down before massacring the crew. So, because choppers are very visible, noisy, and lacking in armor, I predict that a properly-balanced helicopter will be limited in its PvP capabilities, while being a boon to roleplay and flight enthusiasts. By the way, I don't think that mounted weapons are really that necessary for helis at the moment. While we can't mount machine guns at the top hatches of an APC, I don't think that it's very likely for them to be mounted on helicopters, either. So in conclusion, I think that with proper balancing, helis could make the game more fun while still not being too OP. Please spread the word, and support the addition of helicopters to the game, if not as an actual naturally-spawning item, then as a player-spawnable vehicle that we can play with in our single-player worlds!